Counseling in communal structures

Besides our ‘classic’ counseling service responding to individual cases, MBR pursues a systemic approach in the counseling of communes. The topic of this counseling service is the development of commune-wide strategies to foster democracy, for example to develop local studies and analyses and plans of action.

In the course of this ‘top-down’ practice, processes with a communal mandate take place and allow for better inclusion of structures in the communal administration. Strategies of democratization are understood as an effective means to react to right-wing extremism. They are seized as a shared task of the communal administration as well as the general public.

Appropriate and resource-oriented development of strategy by analyses of social space and capability of agency

In Berlin, MBR collaborates with the district offices, institutions on the level of the federated states (schools and police for example), and civic societal institutions (associations for example) to develop tangible and shared goals and plans of action, which appropriate the general recommendations on dealing with right-wing extremism, racism, and anti-Semitism for a local and specific context. The respective characteristics as well as the present institutional and cooperative relations have to be analyzed by MBR. MBR therefore conducts analyses of social space and of capability of agency (so-called ‘stakeholder analyses’), which allow for an appropriate and resource-oriented development of strategy. All people involved will be invited to discuss measures and their implementation in a round-table situation. Different perspectives are collected, expectations, reservations, and ideas considered. The moderation of the process by MBR increases the agreement with the decided measures and makes effects of synergy possible for the further implementation. MBR is able to consider their experience in past cases and connect actors to concentrate knowledge and expertise.

Supervision in implementation of plans of action and communal analyses

Since 2004, MBR covers this field of counseling and supports the development and implementation of communal-wide measures. In the districts of Pankow and Lichtenberg, MBR has been supporting the implementation of plans of action since 2004. In the district of Treptow-Köpenick, MBR works on the implementation of the communal analyses. In late 2005, MBR was commissioned to implement the communal analysis of the district of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg.